Tuesday, February 26, 2013

Beautiful Chaos- Kami Garcia and Margaret Stohl

3.5/5

Beautiful Chaos was a bit of a mixing bag for me. I did like it more that Beautiful Darkness and more than Beautiful Creatures, but I still had some of the same issues.

I love the author’s tone, how they delve into the deep south and bring forth all the little hang ups and beauties of small town life. Even though I do think they play into some of the stereotypes a little too much.

I enjoy the in-between, so all the info that they crammed in to the novel in-between the actual story line and plot. I loved the minor characters like Ethan’s Great Aunts and Lena’s family.

It was all the little tidbits and juicy gossip and small details; like the Caster Tunnels and Ethan’s family that makes this series worth the read. I could read a whole series just about Ethan’s life in Gatlin and his desire to escape it.

But it is the plot line that this book, like the ones before it fail at.

First off I had the plot figured out within the first few chapters of this book. It was not difficult and just made Ethan look incredibly stupid that with all the crap going on around him he could not figure out that The One Who is Two was in fact him…I mean there were dozens of times with the songs, dreams and Amma acting weird that I was like Damn now Ethan has to get it, right? unfortunately….no….Ethan acted stupid almost the entire book. With a novel 500 + pages long one would think that there would be more actual storyline…But there wasn’t.

There was a bit about horrid weather, his Aunt Pru dying (which many people have complained about but since she is IMPORTANT in the last book I found to be some of the better writing) and Abraham trying to find John Breed while he’s actually being kept prisoner by Ridley who eventually finds a way to get her dark magic back….It just wasn’t enough. This book was like going to a steak house and when your meal arrives it’s a 8 ounce potato, with five ounces of salad and a two ounce steak. Now that would be fine if you hadn’t per say gone to a steak house!

As always I loved Link, Liv, Marian, Macon and Ethan, finding them to be the most interesting of the main characters and I enjoyed that they finally got Liv over Ethan and hooked her up with John. Lena was, thankfully, not near as annoying as she was in the two books past, but I still find her to be an all powerful, lack luster, unsympathetic character who writes too much emo bad poetry. Amma was also kind of bugging me in this book, not up to her usual fun second mommy-to-ethan standard.

Some points of interest:

Ethan’s dad kind of hooking up with the glass eyed English teacher was just creepy…I mean in a Why did they do this kind of way…. Like I get why Ms. English was needed, but after Ethan’s mom how could Ethan’s dad hook up with an older creepy pirate lady?

Lilum was bad ass and I was SO very thankful that we could finally get rid of Sarafine, though the flashbacks into her life just made me WTF the basic premises of these books even more. How is it fair that when a Caster in the Ravenwood/Duchanness family goes dark (through no fault of their own) their whole family suddenly gets to treat them like shit? Maybe if they had support and love then the ones who go dark and don’t embrace it, might…I don’t know, not be as horrible. Look at Ridley, she is actually trying to not be a horrible Dark Caster and it’s because Lena still loves her.

I am tired of authors calling relationships liked Liv/John and Ridley/Link love cause it is not. Link is ADDICTED to Ridley, she is a Siren and he is part INCCUBUS. Liv is ADDICTED to John cause he is a INCCUBUS, end of story it’s lust, not love. Stop trying to trick us, we readers iz smart.

The scene where Ridley casts the Furor spell is awesome. Liv just rips into Lena and EVERYTHING she says is stuff I have been thinking about the whole damn series.

” Poor beautiful me. My gorgeous boyfriend is so in love with me, but my heart is broken because-hey-that’s how beautiful emo girls like me are supposed to act. Instead of being happy that a great guy loves me I am going to slap on some more black nail polish and run off with some other gorgeous guy. And-wait for it- I’m the most powerful Caster in the universe.” I wanted to cheer Liv on, though it was a bit like even now the authors are making fun of Lena.

And then at the end where surprise surprise, not, they find out Ethan needs to sacrifice himself cause Lena couldn’t make a damn claiming decision to save her and everyone else’s life Lena spews the worst teen angst since Twilight.

But I want you here. I don’t care if it’s a hundred degrees and every blade of grass dies. Without you done of that matters to me. Yes, you spoiled brat…the world ending is totally less important that the life of your boyfriend, gotcha,

The last bit when Ethan knows he has to die was beautifully written. It even made me tear up a little at the support he is given and how much those he cared about rallied around him. It also made for a smooth transition into the last book.

Over all I enjoyed reading this, way more the Beautiful Darkness, and it was entertaining. Is it the be all and end all of my existence? No…..But it was pretty good for a YA paranormal romance.